Duncan Middle School students got new Chromebooks at the beginning of this semester, and many of them have already been broken.
Barbara Gee, the library administrator and one of the teachers at the Middle School, said, “There have been a total of 47 broken Chromebooks with the most common damage being the screens.”
Keep in mind, students have only had these Chromebooks for about a month and a half. Distribution of the new Chromebooks took place the first week back from Christmas Break. DMS students last got new Chromebooks in August 2021.
This new round of Chromebooks were purchased using a grant DMS received.
“Eight hundred and forty Chromebooks have been purchased at the beginning of January and just a little over 700 Chromebooks have been handed out to students at Duncan middle school,” Gee said.
She said there were ways to avoid damaging Chromebooks. For instance, students should not put personal items between the keyboard and the screen as it can cause severe damage to the Chromebook’s screen and/or keyboard.
Currently, students use Chromebooks in nearly every class at Duncan Middle School. However, with state testing coming up, students around the school will be expected to have access to their Chromebooks. Those without a Chromebook will use a library desktop or borrow a Chromebook from a teacher who has a loner.
Chromebooks have a rental fee that’s a total of 20 dollars to get one, and that 20 dollars can be used to cover the first damage. Every Chromebook also comes with a case to help prevent the computers from getting damaged.
In addition to damage caused by carelessness or accidents, there is also concern that many of the middle school students are sharing Chromebooks with their friends. Not only could this help prevent Chromebooks from going missing, it can also reduce the amount of damage caused.
